64 SPOUTING ADVENTURES IN THE FAR WEST. 



their wigwams there, owing to their belief that it was a 

 fatal spot, and was haunted by the spirit of the brave. Be- 

 ing anxious to see again the place that had so deeply im- 

 pressed itself on my memory, I descended the chasm and 

 visited the grave ; but, on reaching it, I was horror-stricken 

 to find that the wolves had scraped up the body and eaten 

 it. I saw that the remains of the mustang killed by the 

 grizzly had also been devoured by the same hungry creat- 

 ures, and could then readily understand why some of them 

 are one mass of sores in some portions of the West. The 

 sightless, fleshless skull of the brave, with its long, lank 

 hair, was so displeasing a sight to me that I was glad to 

 beat a retreat, and get out of the savage chasm to the gen- 

 tle glade and generous forest above. When I reached camp 

 I did not mention a word of what I had seen to anybody, 

 but on arriving at our destination I told it to the chief; 

 but he manifested no feeling whatsoever in the matter, and 

 did not even make a comment, although I was very careful 

 not to use the name of the brave, knowing how scrupulous 

 they are about referring to the dead. 



A comrade and myself killed a grizzly one day in Wyo- 

 ming by running it down on horseback, but not until after 

 we had planted its body with bullets. While riding to- 

 ward a frontier post we espied the bear pottering about a 

 few cotton-woods that grew on the bank of a small stream. 

 On seeing it, we dashed forward, firing; and both found, 

 when we got to within seventy or eighty yards of it, that 

 our bullets evidently went wide of the mark, for, instead of 

 attempting to run away, it raised itself on its hind-legs, as 

 if it were willing to face all foes in a sparring or wrestling 

 match. The attitude was so gravely ludicrous that I was 

 forced to laugh at it; but my companion, who could see 

 nothing funny in it, thought he could see a good chance 

 for a shot, and he availed himself of it by sending a bullet 

 somewhere into its body. This seemed to impress upon it 

 the idea that mere attitude was nothing, and that its visit- 

 ors were not pleasant creatures to know; so it concluded 

 that discretion was the better part of valor, and, acting on 



